Thedas Correspondence
by Nommy
Summary: You see a lock box filled with letters; they contain secrets and knowledge. You say to yourself, "No, I mustn't read those private documents!" As your hand slips into the confines of the musty, parchment-scented box. "Well...perhaps just a peek?" Letters written by some of Thedas's famous players in the style of the codex (includes mild spoilers for my own FF, 'Base Love'.)
1. Bundle I

_My darling Duke,_

 _My meeting with the Empress_ _'s new Arcane Adviser is concluded and I can scarce hide my amusement; a lowly hedge witch, draped in old, beaten black leather and with hair so frightfully 'styled' it boggles any right-thinking mind. As to what Celene sees in her - or the advice she is sure to dispense in my absence, I cannot say. I worry, my dear - truly I do. This witch is no mage as I am sure you have garnered from my words alone, she was not taught in a Circle but reared out in the backwater wilderness of the Ferelden Korcari Wilds by Chasind wild folk no doubt._

 _You asked me when last we spoke what I make of this Inquisition that seeks to seal the Breach and to that I can honestly still not say. One of their agents, in fact, the agent; the Herald of Andraste bade me welcome to join as long as I am willing to offer my services and I am. I will not sit and wait idly when there is an enemy out there to confront and destroy - especially if it means I can help to keep this world with you in it, safe._

 _I leave for the village of Haven shortly, my dear, I write only to warn you of the changing climate of Celene's court, I have no doubts that of which you already know about but I urge you to take mind and keep yourself safe._

 _With respect and affection, Vivienne._

\- A letter written to Duke Bastien from First Enchanter Vivienne.

* * *

 _Inquisitor,_

 _No one is more frustrated than I that my business for the Grey Wardens takes me away from the troubles of my country, my charge; alas I cannot aid you in this battle quite just yet - assuming it lasts longer than my confounded business, that is._

 _I hear you have this 'Corypheus' on the run - quite right, he is a posing magister from what my people say and I agree. No godhood can be achieved from cracking the world you seek to rule like a chicken's egg. I have every faith that you will lay waste to this creature and be hailed as a hero as I once was and you have my steadfast hopes that you do...I fear for the future of Ferelden if you fail. Terrified, actually, much of what I cherish is nestled in those lands and I would beg of you, please...Keep my country safe if you are to dwell there._

 _My husband writ me of your meeting, taking on the rebels as allies? I would advise caution, Inquisitor - although I have known many good mages in my life I have also met my share of power-mad monsters that wear the faces of friends and foes alike. Your wisdom in recruiting Lady Vivienne of the Orlesian court speaks well of you, however. I would heed her counsel where I you, she is a talented mage if a little grasping and is at the very least rational, unlike that of some of her peers._

 _Look to the Wardens if you have need to, I shall do all that is in my power as Commander to bolster some of your ranks - the Wardens technically should not be involved at all but since this is neither a normal or a political crisis I think we can bend the rules if only a little._

 _I must beseech you now, look after my country and my husband as I am powerless to shield either at the moment. Good luck to you, my friend, you have my sympathies in the coming battles both public and personal, my own experiences tell me that you will need it._

 _Yours, Melody Cousland, Queen of Ferelden and Commander of Ferelden's Grey Wardens._

A hastily written message is scrawled at the bottom:

 _Leliana, I'm keeping Harding- if you want her back, you'll have to find me again._

Another note has been added beneath in a flowing hand:

 _Challenge accepted, Melon._

\- A letter from the Queen of Ferelden to Inquisitor Lavellen and Sister Nightingale.

* * *

 _Mel,_

 _My agents have been scouring the lands in search of you, I don't know if this letter will reach you in any fashionable time to help - if it all - but still, I must try._

 _The Inquisition is in its infancy, all though we have acquired a fortress and a leader, we have been hit hard by the Red Templars and the enemy known as Corypheus. I would ask aid of you since we are in your kingdom and trying to mend the sky; please, Mel - anything you could do would be a marvelous boon and might even raise morale._

 _Tales of our adventures are often told in Skyhold's tavern and it brings a smile to my lips to hear them but not tell. I sit quietly in the shadows of the rookery and listen to the men gossip, ten years on and they still talk of you and all you did. Although not alone I know you would say, ah, you have always been humble - well, good at hiding your pride, I think...Despite my new comrades I find myself missing my old ones, the nature of this letter is not to simply beg for aid; you have been gone some time now and our correspondence has waned._

 _I worry for you and ask you write me back if this letter finds your hand. I pray for you and all our old friends scattered to the winds in this world and the next and I hope that you are safe and well. Rest easy in the knowledge that I look out for your interests and precious things here in your absence as all good friends should._

 _With love, Ana._

 _-_ A letter found in Leliana's study.

* * *

 _Lady Amelia,_

 _While I find your twittering about as interesting as watching moss grow on a rock, I must now ask you - again - to bring your infernal musings about my business to your flock of gabbling fools to a halt. I am the empress's adviser of no small talent and I think even your limited mind can wrap itself around the meaning behind those words._

' _Tis not beneficiary to your health to cross me and mine._

 _\- M_

\- A letter found in the Arcane Enchanter's suit.

* * *

 _Ogs,_

 _I am not joking you when I say this: stop replacing my wine with your filth. I drank it once and once was enough! It's taken me ten years to get the taste of that bile out of my mouth and if you do it again I'll make you gargle darkspawn piss._

\- A note found in a very smelly satchel.

* * *

 _Your Eminence,_

 _I beg of you to reconsider your choice in advisers and replace your newest one with swiftness and severity. She is an infamous apostate and none other than the one that fled the battlefield at Denerim during the Blight. Yes, my lady, she is in fact the witch, Morrigan. While I don't doubt she may have helped during Ferelden's troubled times I do doubt her motives as to why she's here and her loyalties to you, my lady. I urge you to wait for references from Queen Melody - she alone knows the true nature of the black one you have taken to your side in these dark days._

 _We are using all of our resources to locate her at this time. Please, mistress: caution._

A note has been added at the bottom in an angry hand:

 _Foolish little man. If he does get the reference he so seeks I think he may find it surprising. I say let him have it. That is - of course - if he can locate his quarry. I wish him luck where I have had none._

\- A letter unsigned found in Empress Celene's solar at Halamshiral.


	2. Bundle II

_How higher will you climb I wonder?_

 _I had thought you would keep your end of the bargain but you did not really get a say at the end of the Landsmeet did you? No, you sat on the sidelines while your puppet prince murdered my father, a hero in cold blood. Single combat or not - if you had spoken up my father would still be alive - he may even have been of use to Ferelden in the end, we will never know. Because of you._

 _I hope that your reign is not long. I hope that you are barren and haggard by the end. I am what this country needs - you are a grasping little player. I have come to terms that my time as queen may have ended but I shall never stop hoping for your demise, fool. As I sit in this tower in dwellings far below my station like a petty criminal praying that you and that idiot, Alistair fall at the hands of darkspawn I could laugh; I want to live, I want my people to be safe and that runs in complete parallel to what I wish would befall you..._

 _You may stop this and I may be finished. But know that your soft-touch lover will never have me executed, not only that, there would be an insurrection if you did push for it - Eamon will be the first to admit it. So I laugh because you cannot touch me and know this, Melody; I will never go away and I will never ever abdicate in favour of Alistair. Not even if you rack me._

 _Exile me and I shall raise a force to retake my home. Leave me and I shall rot with omens for you upon my lips; that you shall have no more joy of Queenship than I did towards the end. You sit in my chair, remember that._

 _Signed, Anora Mac Tir Theirin, True Queen of Ferelden._

\- A crumpled piece of vellum found in the highest tower of Fort Drakon.

* * *

 _Blondie,_

 _Maker, where do I even begin? Shit, sorry, that's no way to start a letter - especially not this letter...I can't even make my hand form the words and the ink keeps drying on the nib. I've wasted about fifty sheets of parchment and I don't even know if this will be the letter I finally manage to write you...I'm so sorry..._

 _Hawke is...dead. She died in the Fade defending us from some big hunger demon thing. That's the first time I've written it down...it's the worst sentence I've ever wrote, it makes me want to snap the quill and rip up this letter so it won't be true, in black and white, right there in front of me. It's no fiction, though...She died so that we could live, like a true champion but I'm not sure I'm worthy of her sacrifice._

 _I'm sorry that you couldn't be there to help, I really am but I don't know that would have helped anyway. I'm sorry...for everything...I couldn't save her either, my best friend...Andraste forgive me._

 _For I will never forgive myself._

\- A tear-stained letter.

* * *

 _Did you think I would not find out?!_

 _You are a fool if you did not! Varric I promise you this: if it turns out that you have been hiding the Champion from me I will skin you alive before gutting you within an inch of your life before I burn your innards in front of your eyes as your life blood runs out of you._

 _Do not test me._

Beside the angry scrawl there is a naughty picture of a bum.

 _Where would you even hide a champion anyway?_

 _A champion hiding place_

 _Lady Seeker's gotta big temper like her sword_

 _Better watch smarty pants Varric cos she'd have you_

Underneath is a detailed picture of Varric being beaten up by Cassandra

 _You guys gonna fight?_

 _Do it under the tavern window_

 _I'll get sugared plumbs for it!_

\- A crumpled note that's been smoothed out found in Sera's room.

* * *

 _Your Sexiness,_

 _I know you hate the lustful letters but I find it amusing to imagine you blushing as you read my words. Anyway I write to inform you of a particularly interesting little nugget of gossip that I think you will find rather intriguing; Wardens moving through Antiva. I know what you're thinking - not that interesting._

 _Well what you may not know is that when they were asked as to their business they used choice words which I picked up on; words that you used when last we met - calling, death, secret and deep roads. So that got me thinking; where did they go? Aha! The Deep Roads of course! So now I need to ask for your company when you resurface - there is no way out of the deep roads beneath Antiva bar the way you go in, so I know where you'll resurface._

 _You simply must see my lovely cage._

\- Z

\- A pleasant smelling letter found in the Crow Master's office.

* * *

 _I know you're hurting but he had to go, he did not want to but he had to._

 _He won't come back to claim you falsely he loves you too much._

 _It was real and no matter what you feel now you know it was too._

 _He doesn't want you to save him but to live while you can._

 _Stop gazing across that terrible distance at him._

 _Looking over with your sad blue eyes with love and betrayal in your heart both._

 _He knows it hurts you._

 _It...hurts...him._

 _I don't want my friends to hurt anymore._

 _-_ A strange message found on the mirror in the Inquisitor's chambers.

* * *

 _Uncle,_

 _I am well thank you for your concern...I joined the loyalists in the end. I am in a safe place far from the fighting, before I was helping wounded with my healing magic and assisting the Mothers at the Crossroads. I saw what the separatists did, they were mad with a horrible hunger in their eyes - an insatiable need for revenge on those that had locked them away from the world so long ago..._

 _I think I am blessed to have known my family at least - many, if not all of the other apprentices did not and ached because of it. I heard that the sundering of the sky was due to a mage, pray it is not so, Uncle, for fear of my kind is rampant enough without the Divine's death laid at our feet, Maker rest her soul._

 _There was news the other day that Redcliffe had been retaken by the Inquisition and yourself restored, I breathed such a sigh of relief to know that you escaped with your life and weren't hurt. I would have ridden all night to heal you if I had to. I dare not tell you where I am at this moment in time but it was thanks to an old friend of yours that I got away; it's the second time she's saved my life, I think...I believe I owe her more than just my life at this point. Eternal servitude perhaps?_

 _Yours faithfully, Connor._

\- A letter found in Arl Teagan's office.

* * *

 _My Queen,_

 _Know that my loyalty transcends all time and space and that forever and beyond you shall always be my truest queen. The Cousland slut's days are numbered on the throne, already she sweats trying to keep your crown steady on her head. The people are quietly divided, while most are simply happy to an end to the civil war many grumble about your treatment by the false monarchs. The matter of your imprisonment is another matter; I truly do not think we can bring them down on that accusation alone, you are after all - and pardon my impertinence - you are not exactly 'imprisoned' in the way that people would believe your well being was in jeopardy, the Banns and Arls have declared you officially under house arrest until you swear your fealty to King Alistair, bah._

 _Forgive me, my lady but I am afraid there is little we can do to put a dent in the Warden Queen's popularity while she still rides her heroic achievement of defeating the Archdemon and ending the Blight - the one good thing to come of this sorry predicament for sure - as it assures that there will be a day when House Mac Tir shall rise again with you at its head to tear down the Noble Fool of Highever._

 _Until then, I advise you to wait and bide your time. Quietly gather allies and ready your strength for if you still have the will to fight when this queen falls - as she must - you will find steadfast allies in the true nobility of Ferelden who have not forgotten the oaths they swore you when your were crowned our Golden Queen._

 _Your loving and enduring servant as long as time endures._

\- An intricately folded letter written in cipher found in an unclaimed lock box.

* * *

 _Sera!_

 _For the one thousandth time, do not pin undergarments to my doorway when foreign dignitaries are in residence! Next time I shall retaliate and you have not seen undergarments like Antivan undergarments._

 _You have been warned._

 _Josephine_

Sera's drawn a picture of herself showing her bum with her tongue out.

 _Felt you were smiling as you wrote that_

 _Need a double door for Antivan knickers!_

A picture of Antivan undergarments takes up the rest of the page.

\- Another note found in Sera's room.


End file.
